A great hostel in Warsaw - a truly unique place. It felt like being immersed in another century. The whole hostel welcomes you with an elegant atmosphere from the late 19th century. Imagine rooms with wooden beds, little lamps and photographs – everything is arranged and decorated with a lot of love. Enjoy discovering historical interior design. My personal favourites were the crochet tea-cloths!

On the other hand I didn’t miss any modern comforts - I had a modern bathroom and was checking my mail every night. Placed in the heart of the city, very near to the medieval Market square, it is also ideally located.

Wodkowica 5 street
www.hostelbookers.com/hostels/poland/wroclaw/19817/

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Fascinating place that feels like a throwback to the Iron Curtain days, with fur-coat wearing, sharp-eyed merchants selling everything from gas masks and old Soviet coins to bootlegged pornographic DVDs. There is also plenty of, ahem, knock-down vodka and cigarettes on offer, but not to the naked eye. And whatever you do, don’t try to take any photographs. Stalin may be long dead, but paranoia is still alive and well in certain parts of his old domain.

Location: Stadion Dziesięciolecia.
Getting there: Number 12 tram from Srodmiescie Station.

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Cheap and cheerful, if not exactly charming. Great location and nice rooms, this hostel stands out simply by being such in a city dominated by pricey hotels. The staff are friendly, but Oki-Doki perhaps takes its unique status for granted, often requiring guests to change rooms. But it really is just 10 minutes’ walk from the Old Town, less to the Palace of Culture and Science, and its in-house bar is good craic till the wee hours.

Plac Dabrowskiego 3, Corner of Marszalkowska and Swietokrzyska;
Getting there: Taxi from the airport costs about 30 Z/;
tel: 48 22 826 5112;
okidoki@okidoki.pl;
www.okidoki.pl

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The district of Nalewki was home to Warsaw's large Jewish community before World War II. In 1940 the Nazi occupying forces turned this district into the Jewish Ghetto.

The inhabitants - hundreds and thousands of Jews from Warsaw and surrounding areas - were forced to live in appalling, over-crowded conditions. Over 100,000 died from starvation and disease and a further 300,000 were deported to extermination camps.

In early 1943 members of the Jewish Fighters Organisation and the ghetto rose up against the Nazi occupiers, planned less as a bid for physical freedom than to show that acts of independence, defiance and will are a freedom in themselves. The Ghetto Uprising was violently suppressed and the whole of the ghetto demolished.

Today at the centre of the former ghetto is the Monument to the Ghetto Heroes, erected in 1948 as a tribute to those who fought and died in the ghetto. It is a very moving piece of sculpture and a sombre starting point to the Path of Remembrances – a walk through the former ghetto marked by 16 granite blocks commemorating those who lived and died in the ghetto and the extermination camps. Along the walk is the Bunker Monument marking the spot from were the rebellion was co-ordinator and the walk ends at the very moving Umschlagplatz Monument, at the site of the railway siding from where so many Jews were transported to their deaths.

The monuments are simple and very effecting, not only by reminding you of the suffering that occurred during that time but also of the spirit which allowed people to demonstrate their freedom even in the face of death.

Zamenhofa ( Monument to the Ghetto Heroes)

The Path of Remembrance runs from the Monument to Ghetto Heros on Zamenhofa to the Umschlagplatz Monument on Stawki.
the Bunker Monument is on Dzielna

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